


cathedral stains

by fated_addiction



Category: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Crystal, Code Name: Sailor V
Genre: Angst, F/M, Romance, all my feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-20
Updated: 2014-11-20
Packaged: 2018-02-26 10:12:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2648225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fated_addiction/pseuds/fated_addiction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The milkshake is starting to melt.</i> Usagi stumbles. There is no room for getting older.</p>
            </blockquote>





	cathedral stains

**Author's Note:**

> What is life, guys. What is life. Spoilers for all episodes of SM: Crystal and I suppose some manga-ish elements too. I have a bad habit of speculating and combining both because of how much closer they are and seem to be. Everything is connected, right? Anyways, enjoy!

Motoki buys her a milkshake. It's still Sunday; Usagi's seen Mamoru twice. She knows that Minako is in a table behind her, watching. It's a sequence: what follows will be Ami, Makoto, and Rei, last for her shrine duties. 

The milkshake is starting to melt.

 

-

 

He reappears on a school day. It's one of those days, one of the very last few days that Usagi feels and takes her mother's words to heart. _Just be a normal girl_. She trips and falls though. She skins her knee and her math test rips, even with her mother's signature.

Luna scolds her. Her eyes are burning. The skin around her knee puckers and she shifts her skirt back, hissing when she touches it.

"Are you all right?" and she flinches, her eyes wide (the second time), wider than she'd like as he kneels by her leg. He walked away the first time. The first time, she didn't think he was real.

His fingers brush over her skin. She hisses. Her teeth pick at her lip and she cannot help but meet his gaze; he isn't looking at her. His eyes are dark.

"I'm clumsy," she mumbles.

He chuckles and studies the blood. "I see that."

Luna is gone, but she is nearby. Usagi can feel her hover by a storefront. The sense of energy that settles is odd. It's subtle, first. Then after, it begins to build like a panic. It twists in her stomach, then starts to crawl up and into her throat. He looks normal, she thinks. He wears his uniform. His tie is pressed. She knows that this is Mamoru. She tries and thinks of it simply. _He's safe_. It isn't simple.

"Can you stand?"

"Maybe." Then she says quickly, flushed. "After I stopped being embarrassed."

He laughs softly. "I'm sure you'll be fine."

He helps her too. His hand is large and covers hers. He tugs her gently, oh so gently, to her feet and her knee stings. She grits her teeth. She falls, just slightly, and her fist rests against his chest. This is enough distance. She tries and keeps herself sane.

"Arigato," she murmurs, and honestly. She pushes herself up to look at him. Her eyes widen again. Her lips part and she swallows. It's Mamoru, she tells herself again. 

He says nothing in return. His mouth twitches. His fingers touch her shoulder. He nods and turns away, school bag dragging over his shoulder. She turns to watch him go. She's shaking, but she doesn't know how to acknowledge it. Her head hurts, but it isn't spinning. She watches him until he turns another building, into another street, maybe to school; more likely not.

Her knuckles brush against the crystal. He's missed it.

It becomes real.

 

 

"It was anti-climatic," she murmurs, later, to Minako out of all people. She trusts Minako. She doesn't trust Minako. She thinks it's mostly the latter because Minako struggles with trusting herself. But for whatever reason, she feels like Minako is the only one she can tell.

They stand outside the shrine. Rei is inside by the fire. Makoto is on her way; Ami will be later too because she had to stop by the hospital and see her mother. Usagi stands a bit away from Minako though, wrapped in a jacket with her hands digging hard into its pockets. She turns her chin. The moon is starting to rise and she feels tired.

"I was waiting to scream," she confesses. "Or cry. Or maybe I did cry -- maybe more for Luna than for myself. But I felt frozen. I felt like I didn't have any kind of control. I think that scares me more."

Minako is quiet. She isn't looking at her; Usagi already knows the difference. There is always too much of a sharpness.

"You feel like you're losing a part of yourself," she says finally.

Usagi nods.

"Weird, right?"

"Weird," Usagi agrees.

The breeze picks up. It's colder at night, near the shrine. The season are changing. She is still trying to look around and figure out what it was exactly that Serenity saw and loved. Memories are still too strange to tackle.

But Minako shuffles forward and loops her arm through hers, pulling her closer to her. Usagi's still smaller and fits against her slightly. They huddle for warmth, but make no move to go inside.

"What's your gut telling you?"

Usagi blinks. Then she swallows, looking down. "It's him," she says. "And he's removed enough for me to feel all that negative energy. It's there. I just didn't feel it. Maybe it's because he knew that I'm me or that it's not really that complicated. Everything about this is telling me to trust myself and not --" she doesn't know to go on and her fingers dig into Minako's arm, "-- I felt so small," she finishes.

"You can be scared," Minako murmurs. She leans closer. "You're allowed to be."

Her eyes burn. "I don't _want_ to," she says. "And I don't want to be tired either. I've done nothing. I don't know how to do anything else but this now. I hurt. I'm angry. I'm sad. I'm worried about all of you. I don't know who I am some days. Am I Usagi? Am I the Princess? Am I both? How do I even start to be _both_? How does that work, Minako-chan?"

Then she's crying. She's crying but it's not what she expects. Her skin is wet. She shakes. But her feet are planted on the ground and she's holding Minako; Minako is not holding her up. It feels like she's aging, somehow, and something inside of her twists and aches and she wants desperately for the girls to understand but this part of her, the part that's threatening to burst through doesn't belong to them.

She feels too much. She reels herself in too. Piece by piece; _stop it_ , she tells herself, and _you know better_. She judges herself. She's her own worst enemy. Her ears are ringing and she reminds herself to call home. Another lie, another day.

"Sorry," she manages, after. Breathe again, she thinks.

Minako presses her forehead against hers. She never judges. 

"I think he'll come to you," she says.

 

-

 

He is Endymoin.

There is a battle. Ami breaks her ankle and for the first time, Usagi heals. It's small scale. She uses her body and her hands. She wills Ami's bones to mend. She's tired and there's only bruising on the skin. She takes on the pain.

It still takes too much from her. Ami feels guilty. Makoto helps and lets the other senshi lean against her. Rei has a hand around Usagi's wrist and Minako is separate from the group, staring at the spot that Kunzite once occupied. 

Usagi's knees almost buckle.

 

-

 

She has homework.

The girls are underneath the arcade. She won't let them know she's here yet. She limps towards a Sailor V game, but it's otherwise occupied. She doesn't look. Motoki calls her name from the counter and she waves a hand, almost agreeing to whatever it is that he'll decide to make for her.

She moves to the game. Her hands are sweaty. Her fingers link in front of her and she sits next at the hub next to her game. She stares at the blank screen and shifts to the stool to face him.

"So this is what you do," he says.

She looks up and it's _Endymoin_ all over again, watching her curiously and carefully, calculating almost. She swallows and her hair falls into her face. She trembles a little and her hands drop to her lap.

"Sometimes," she admits, and it doesn't take her long to assess the situation, that he knows her -- of _her_ and otherwise -- and that there is no point in lying to him. Lying is much more volatile than the truth. The arcade is too open as it is.

HIs eyes are still dark, blue but not blue. There's a swirl of humanity in them. It's lie, she tells herself. But she romanticizes it too -- blue like the end of the night, the sea, and all things she's supposed to think of as just a girl. His lips twist and pucker and he leans forward, crossing his legs and resting his chin on his hand. She wonders what they look like. Maybe it's a date.

"I see you have the crystal."

Her teeth pick at her lip. "No," she says. "My father gave this to me."

"Can I touch it?"

Her head tilts. She shifts forward.

"You could. But you won't."

He chuckles. "Very good, Princess."

"I'm learning," she replies, and she is very aware that it makes her much more of a danger than he needs her to be. She's the wild card. She's volatile and for Beryl and the rest, to not understand how she and the crystal are that much more connected is even more dangerous than ever. 

He reaches forward and brushes his fingers against her chin. They're soft and warm, careful again. She licks her lips and he studies her. She doesn't back away.

"I'm going to take my time, you know."

His voice is soft. It's sudden too. His thumb slides over her lip. She makes a sound and his lips turn.

"Although I recognize the need and sense of urgency," he murmurs. "I'm much more suited to this kind of game than the rest of them."

"This isn't a game," she protests. It sounds small. He shifts into her knees. She clears her throat. "It's not that simple."

He smiles and it's dangerous.

"But it is," he says.

He kisses her.

It's not five, not ten minutes, not even fifteen. It's abrupt. It's chaotic. The girls are coming in or coming up and Motoki is nearing with a milkshake. She should move to a table, she thinks. Or tries to think. But it's Mamoru's mouth, or Endymoin's mouth, still cruel, maybe even crueler against hers. His fingers slide through her hair and she thinks _selfish_ , even as her mouth opens back into his. She sighs and he swallows it. Her body is selfish and has no escape. Her hands are on his thighs. He leans closer, almost bent over her, and she tries not to be too relieved. Her mouth grows warm and she makes another sound when he pushes his tongue into hers. He tastes like coffee. It's bitter and heavy and her fingers are fisting into his jacket.

He bites at her lip and draws back.

She isn't smiling. Her fingers twitch. The chain around her neck feels naked, but her hands fall into her lap.

"See you soon," he says.

Later, there is milkshake pooling around the keypad. 

It stains her sleeve cuff.


End file.
